Bobcat: How did you come to understand Matthew 24 as you do?It has been a process and researching covering about 15 years. The NICNT-Matthew commentary (R. T. France) I found very useful. It did not fully complete the picture for me, but it did put many of the pieces in place. France has a very practical view and a willingness to depart from standard views when the text suggests it. His commentary is one of my favorite and useful books in my personal library. He sees "this generation" exactly as you take it, and he assumes from there that "these things" simply had to be understood within that time frame.
Matthew 24:34 not fulfilled in the first century
by Jules Saturn 35 Replies latest watchtower bible
-
Bobcat
-
Doug Mason
The Matthew Gospel is structured as a series of five discourses. Each discourse begins and ends in the same fashion. Check the details with a search of the www.
The fifth discourse commences at the start of Matthew 23, with Jesus in the temple. After repeatedly berating the Scribes and the Pharisees (Jesus belonged to a different Jewish sect, the Nazorenes / Nazoroeans), the Gospel uses language to show that Jesus left the Temple both physically and spiritually. This leads into the question that the Gospel writers put into Jesus' mouth about the Temple while he was departing it. When they were writing, the Temple had been ransacked by the Romans 15 years previously.
In the following, Jesus' coming out of the temple and walking away from it has to be understood spiritually. Read it all from the beginning of the Fifth Discourse, the start of Chapter 23.
"See, your house is left to you, desolate. For I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, 'Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.'" As Jesus came out of the temple and was going away, his disciples came to point out to him the buildings of the temple. Then [Jesus] asked [his four disciples], "You see all these, do you not? Truly I tell you, not one stone will be left here upon another; all will be thrown down." (Matthew 23:38-24:2, NRSV).
Doug
-
Crazyguy
Peters sermon at Acts chapter two goes along with Vader’s thoughts . This sermon explains in plain detail that Peter was saying it, that they were that last generation.
-
Crazyguy
I would just like to say that I firmly believe that the writings of the gospels were written after 70 Ad and many of the details to what was said an done came out of Joshepus writtings. He mentions several Jesus’s and what they said and did and was done to them. If you take all the jesus and add together their stories they could easily make up the story of the Son of God jesus. Same can be said to some of the events Josephus wrote about during the war and destruction of Jerusalem.
There’s obvoius throw backs to Writtings found in the Old Testament and the writer of Mathew was doing his darndest to make Jesus fulfill prophecies so much so he had him doing things that weren’t prophecies at all.
-
waton
last man standing: "----the righteous ones into everlasting life: --"
These are the last men and women standing of that last generation, not what wt has made of them the long departed anointed generation.
thank you for pasting that, just saying, not fully endorsing.
-
lastmanstanding
waton
These are the last men and women standing of that last generation, not what wt has made of them the long departed anointed generation.
I think it’s more and more, perhaps moving into the realm of universally, understood that the “generation” being referred to is the generation that was in vogue at the time, the generation to which Jesus himself belonged.
Counter argument for the below..?
thank you for pasting that, just saying, not fully endorsing.
-
waton
the generation to which Jesus himself belonged.
exactly, he was the only anointed present at that conversation, wt's singling out the "anointed" is strained, even before overlapping. All present people move through time contemporaneously.
thank you for pasting that, just saying, not fully endorsing.
I find these discussion meaningful. That does not mean though that the basic premise, that The Earth was created at the beginning, or there was a talking snake, which is basic to all the biblical development should be taken seriously.
commenting but not endorsing.
-
-
peacefulpete
Without an appreciation of the complex literary development of these writings it becomes impossible to begin to interpret them as they were intended. Even when we have some insight into that process the best we can do is make educated guesses. Matt, Luke and John were sectarian revisionings of an early form of Mark. Mark itself went through harmonizing redaction after the others were canonized. Expansion and reordering and at times deletion of elements their respective communities wanted/needed in their version of the story. The prophecy of the destruction of Jerusalem was not exempted from this process. It's possible some original form of apocalyptic anticipation was included in an early collection of Jesus stories in an early form of Mark but after the first, second and maybe even the third Jewish wars, details were incorporated to flesh out the 'prophecy' with details. 'Predictions' declaring the absolute abandonment and disassembly of Jerusalem for example really only make sense after the Bar Kochba revolt (136AD).
-
Crazyguy
Going along with Peacfulpete, if you read about the arguments concerning Jesus at Nicea 325 you’ll find they could of answered some of these issues by just reading the gospel of John and possibly some of the other New Testament writtings. This leads me to believe that the gospel of john and other New Testament writtings were not written until after this meeting.
Many scholars believe that a good portion of the New Testament was written by Eusebius.